I honestly don't care about local channels, retransmission consent, or anything else. Cable companies are breaking out the costs for local broadcast channels, but we as customers cannot opt out. If cable companies could offer service WITHOUT local channels, you'd probably see a lot of folks opt out.

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I don't even think I've even met anyone that doesn't watch the local channels. Whether it is the local news, local sports or the Network programming. Everyone I've run into watches something from a local network at some time or another.

I don't even think I've even met anyone that doesn't watch the local channels. Whether it is the local news, local sports or the Network programming. Everyone I've run into watches something from a local network at some time or another.

I don't even think I've even met anyone that doesn't watch the local channels. Whether it is the local news, local sports or the Network programming. Everyone I've run into watches something from a local network at some time or another.

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I don't watch anything on local channels.

Now you've met someone.

And what relevance does that have to the question at hand? Whether or not most or all people watch local channels doesn't matter. I should have the choice of if I'm going to pay for it. Also, my primary reason for not wanting to buy local channels from the cable company wouldn't be so that I didn't have access. It would be so that I could use my antenna to watch what I can get for free.

I live plenty close to town that I pick up all the locals with an antenna. Why should I be forced to pay for what I can very easily pick up for free just because I also want to get ESPN and TNT and HBO?

And what relevance does that have to the question at hand? Whether or not most or all people watch local channels doesn't matter. I should have the choice of if I'm going to pay for it. Also, my primary reason for not wanting to buy local channels from the cable company wouldn't be so that I didn't have access. It would be so that I could use my antenna to watch what I can get for free.

I live plenty close to town that I pick up all the locals with an antenna. Why should I be forced to pay for what I can very easily pick up for free just because I also want to get ESPN and TNT and HBO?

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Likewise here, if I could get a cheaper monthly rate by having a the local networks removed from my cable service I would do it in a heartbeat. The only things my local networks offer in my area is as bad as 35 minutes of show content with 25 minutes of commercials. Don't even get me started with how my cable company inserts SD commercials into a HD broadcast which totally screws up the TiVo fast forward. Personally I believe local broadcast channels will eventually fade away in a few more years, too many sources for the same content from national sources on the Internet.

You make a good point but Aereo than becomes just another cable co to you and your reception would now be from a RJ45 jack not coax cable and Aereo should pay for the programing, just like any cable co now has to, if they did there would be no court case.

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Wow. Total lack of understanding of the law there. Aereo isn't re-transmitting, hence why they are 100% in the clear legally.

Wow. Total lack of understanding of the law there. Aereo isn't re-transmitting, hence why they are 100% in the clear legally.
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I don't understand your statement above, (Aereo isn't re-transmitting) that is your opinion, not any fact or it would not be in the highest Court.

Why is Aereo any less re-transmitting then that of a cable co ??, You can't even put up an antenna in a sports bar without paying to show the programing to your customers. OTA is for personal use only, unless you pay for commercial use of the OTA signal. Some grey area in the Aereo case, that is why it is in the Court, IMHO they will not win, but that only my opinion, and I am not on the Court.

Wow. Total lack of understanding of the law there. Aereo isn't re-transmitting, hence why they are 100% in the clear legally....

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Wow. Total lack of understanding of the technology and the law.

They receive an 8VSB signal, decode it into the original MPEG 2 data, and then retransmit this data via IP packets (which are encoded using one of several possible streaming protocols). They only way this could NOT be a retransmission would be to deliver the 8VSB signal to the viewers TV or DVR tuners.

Therefore, they are in violation of the law. Their only hope is that the SCOTUS carves out a special exception for them on the grounds that the end result is the same as having relayed the original ATSC broadcast.

And what relevance does that have to the question at hand? Whether or not most or all people watch local channels doesn't matter. I should have the choice of if I'm going to pay for it. Also, my primary reason for not wanting to buy local channels from the cable company wouldn't be so that I didn't have access. It would be so that I could use my antenna to watch what I can get for free.

I live plenty close to town that I pick up all the locals with an antenna. Why should I be forced to pay for what I can very easily pick up for free just because I also want to get ESPN and TNT and HBO?

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I would save more money dropping all the ESPN channels than dropping the local channels. The ESPN channels cost alot more. I don't even know why there are so many ESPN channels. I only watch the main one. Yet I'm forced to pay for all the other ones that I will never watch. The local programming cost is minor compared to the cost of the ESPN channels.

But not watching any local channels I would think is unusual. Just from the local sports teams, many people watch the local channels at one time or another because of them.

I would save more money dropping all the ESPN channels than dropping the local channels. The ESPN channels cost alot more. I don't even know why there are so many ESPN channels. I only watch the main one. Yet I'm forced to pay for all the other ones that I will never watch. The local programming cost is minor compared to the cost of the ESPN channels.

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Planet Money did a pretty good podcast about how cable bills got to the point they are at. They specifically talk about ESPN.

They compare cable pricing to that of a grocery store. Imagine going to the grocery store and being told you must buy an orange for every apple you buy? You would walk out of the store and go to the store down the street. Unfortunately, this can't be done by most people when it come to cable.

Planet Money did a pretty good podcast about how cable bills got to the point they are at. They specifically talk about ESPN.

They compare cable pricing to that of a grocery store. Imagine going to the grocery store and being told you must buy an orange for every apple you buy? You would walk out of the store and go to the store down the street. Unfortunately, this can't be done by most people when it come to cable.

I must say though. I do pay alot less than I did when I had DirecTV from 2001 to 2007. I was paying them around $120 a month and had fewer channels than I have now with FiOS. While TV with FiOS is costing me around $70 a month right now.

I would save more money dropping all the ESPN channels than dropping the local channels. The ESPN channels cost alot more. I don't even know why there are so many ESPN channels. I only watch the main one. Yet I'm forced to pay for all the other ones that I will never watch. The local programming cost is minor compared to the cost of the ESPN channels.

But not watching any local channels I would think is unusual. Just from the local sports teams, many people watch the local channels at one time or another because of them.

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I understand that you'd save money by dropping ESPN. And, we're just a step away from having an argument about a la carte.

The difference between being forced to buy my local channels and being forced to buy ESPN is that 1) the local channels built their business using the public airwaves that they got for free. airwaves that belong to you and me, but I have to pay for the privilege to watch them. 2) and, this steams me even worse, is that *I can pick up every single local station for free with an antenna*. How is their signal worth more because it reaches me over coax instead of me grabbing it out of the air?

And again, just because *you* can't see why people would not watch locals, doesn't mean that we aren't out there. There's no local sports teams in my market. The news here sucks, bad. And network primetime TV is garbage.

I understand that you'd save money by dropping ESPN. And, we're just a step away from having an argument about a la carte.

The difference between being forced to buy my local channels and being forced to buy ESPN is that 1) the local channels built their business using the public airwaves that they got for free. airwaves that belong to you and me, but I have to pay for the privilege to watch them. 2) and, this steams me even worse, is that *I can pick up every single local station for free with an antenna*. How is their signal worth more because it reaches me over coax instead of me grabbing it out of the air?

And again, just because *you* can't see why people would not watch locals, doesn't mean that we aren't out there. There's no local sports teams in my market. The news here sucks, bad. And network primetime TV is garbage.

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What OTA channels are worth too you or any other individual is irrelevant. The same is true for any individual cable channel.

You get the packages being offered by your cable company because your cable company has decided that those package are providing the most profit for the cable company.

They could refuse to pay for your locals but they made a business decision to pay for them. You can thank Satellite for that, if your cable company was the only option they would refuse to pay for locals and your locals would have no choice but to allow the cable company to carry them for free (actually your locals would force the cable company to carry them - but it would be for free).

I have posted in another thread that this whole channel setup regardless if it is cable or OTA should be destroyed. We will never see a la carte "cable" without a government mandate and over site. Better off to just replace the whole thing.

What OTA channels are worth too you or any other individual is irrelevant. The same is true for any individual cable channel.

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It has nothing to do with what it's worth to me. Again, this isn't an a la carte situation. It's a distinct issue from bundling of cable channels. Local broadcast stations built their business using airwaves they got for free, along with the fact that I can put up an antenna and legally get the content for free.

They receive an 8VSB signal, decode it into the original MPEG 2 data, and then retransmit this data via IP packets (which are encoded using one of several possible streaming protocols). They only way this could NOT be a retransmission would be to deliver the 8VSB signal to the viewers TV or DVR tuners.

Therefore, they are in violation of the law. Their only hope is that the SCOTUS carves out a special exception for them on the grounds that the end result is the same as having relayed the original ATSC broadcast.

They receive an 8VSB signal, decode it into the original MPEG 2 data, and then retransmit this data via IP packets (which are encoded using one of several possible streaming protocols). They only way this could NOT be a retransmission would be to deliver the 8VSB signal to the viewers TV or DVR tuners.

Therefore, they are in violation of the law. Their only hope is that the SCOTUS carves out a special exception for them on the grounds that the end result is the same as having relayed the original ATSC broadcast.

Cable companies don't have monopolies on subscription television service. I know a lot of people refuse to acknowledge this, because they themselves have fewer personal choices because of their own personal biases and preferences, but the law is clear and consistently applied in this regard.

It has nothing to do with what it's worth to me. Again, this isn't an a la carte situation. It's a distinct issue from bundling of cable channels. Local broadcast stations built their business using airwaves they got for free, along with the fact that I can put up an antenna and legally get the content for free.

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If what you are saying is that cable, Satellite, Aereo, whoever, should be able to rebroadcast OTA channels without paying a rebroadcasting fee because of the nature of OTA broadcasting (free & add supported) then I am in agreement with you.

However that is not what the current laws allow. From a cable company business point of view carrying local OTA stations is not much different than carrying any other cable only channel. The cable company pays the lowest fee possible with the one difference being the law mandates the network channels be in the basic cable package, so the cost of OTA channels has to be built into that package.

They receive an 8VSB signal, decode it into the original MPEG 2 data, and then retransmit this data via IP packets (which are encoded using one of several possible streaming protocols). They only way this could NOT be a retransmission would be to deliver the 8VSB signal to the viewers TV or DVR tuners.

Therefore, they are in violation of the law. Their only hope is that the SCOTUS carves out a special exception for them on the grounds that the end result is the same as having relayed the original ATSC broadcast.

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At the time, way, way back when, when the concept of re-transmission of a broadcast signal arose, the definition was pretty much the same as that of transmission--analog modulation of a carrier wave coupled into an antenna that sent it out into "the ether".

So we have a situation where the actual definition of transmission and re-transmission has grown with the development of newer technologies or advances in older ones, and the law lags behind, leaving the courts to decide whether new ways of doing things are violations of the original intent of the legislatures and legislators who wrote those laws.

If you're going to argue that de-modulation and re-modulation define re-transmission, then why, a few years ago, would a (hypothetical) cable company, that received an analog NTSC TV broadcast and just fed it into a booster amp ahead of splitters ahead of more boosters ahead of more splitters until it eventually reached the antenna input of a cable subscribers television, owe the station anything, as I'm sure the station would have argued?

The problem is the ridiculous notion that broadcasters using the public airwaves to send out their signal get to tell the public, in the geographic area the broadcaster is licensed to serve, how they may and may not receive that signal.

That is a totally separate issue from broadcasters expecting to be paid when anyone, in the geographical area which they are licensed to serve via over the air signals, employs an outside party to assist in the reception of those signals.

If there were 5 different cable companies whose cables ran past your house and you were free to do business with whichever one you wished, the broadcasters in your area would still expect you to pay, through whichever cable company to which you subscribed, for getting the same signal over that cable which you are entitled to pull out of the air with your own equipment for free.